The Blessed Life - 1 Samuel 18:17-30

What does it mean to be blessed? Is it having a perfect, happy family—one where every holiday is picture-perfect and every child obediently follows the path we’ve dreamed for them? Is it having unlimited financial resources—never worrying about bills, always having more than enough to live in comfort? Is it traveling the world, experiencing different cultures, and enjoying all the beauty and wonder this world has to offer?

Our culture certainly seems to think so. Scroll through social media, and you’ll see the hashtag #blessed stamped on pictures of dream vacations, new homes, and milestone celebrations. And while none of those things are bad, they force us to ask an important question: Is this really what it means to be blessed in God’s eyes?

In our passage, one of the things that really stands out is just how blessed David was. He seemed to have the world at his finger tips. Everything seemed to be going his way.

What we’re reminded of in this passage is that the blessings we experience in life have been handed down to us from God. In fact, the blessings we experience in our lives are signs of God’s grace towards us more than the result of our own efforts.

James reminds us that “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” In our passage this morning we’re reminded that God’s hand of blessing protects (vv. 17-19), empowers (vv. 20-27), and grants us success (vv. 28-30).

Last week, we looked at how Saul had become increasingly jealous of David. He was jealous of his great victory. He was jealous of his popularity. He was jealous of his success. Unfortunately, Saul understood all of David’s accomplishments as a threat to his power.

Which was somewhat ironic because Saul was King in Israel and David worked for Saul! Saul retained all the power and yet he was jealous of David. In fact, he was so jealous of David that he attempted to take his life twice!

II. God Protects (vv. 17-19)

But of course, the Lord protected David then and the Lord protected in this passage as well. As I’m sure you noticed this passage centers a lot around marriage. Saul offered two of his daughters to David, and of course, the Lord’s hand of protection was upon David.

Who you marry is one of the most important decisions you’ll ever make. Perhaps some of you look back on your dating history and see God’s hand of protection upon you! What’s interesting about what happens here is that God’s hand of protection is on David, but it’s not like he necessarily dodged a bullet in Merab.

Rather, God protected David from Saul who desired to manipulate and control David through marriage. In a few different places in the Bible, marriage is used as a tool to manipulate and control someone.

The classic example of this in my mind is Laban’s dealing with Jacob. Do y’all remember that? Jacob said he would work for seven years so he could marry Rachel, but Laban kept changing and extending his work agreement in order to keep him around longer.

In the ancient world love and compatibility were important, but they considered other factors that aren’t nearly as important to us today as quite important: namely, will the family you marry into have a positive social and economic impact on our family?

Marrying the right person could pull you out of poverty or gain the respect of those around you.

Of course, it’s important to consider the family you’re going to be around all the time once you’re married, but it’s not something that we think about nearly as much here in America. I bring all of this up because if you remember, Saul had offered his daughter’s hand in marriage to the man who would kill Goliath. At least, that was the rumor flying around the Israelite camp, which was to encourage someone to challenge Goliath.

Because your status would be immediately lifted once you became son-in-law to the king. There would certainly be both social and economic benefits to marrying Saul’s daughter. You would be a part of the most powerful family in all of Israel.

And so, when Saul offered his eldest daughter to David, he was giving him the opportunity of a lifetime. David had so much to gain from marrying Merab. David was a no-name shepherd boy from rinky-dink Bethlehem but if he married Merab, he’d suddenly be the King’s son-in-law.

But there’s more to this arrangement than meets the eye. Saul wants to keep his friends close and his enemies closer. Because there were strings attached to marrying Merab. Notice what Saul told David in verse 17, “Only be valiant for me and fight the Lord's battles.”

It’s a throwaway comment if we didn’t already know that Saul wanted David dead. What he’s telling David there is if you marry Merab you’re going to have to go and fight wherever I send you.

And of course, David would be fine with that arrangement. David has already been fighting for Israel, so how would that change anything? The end of verse 17 gives us the answer: “Let not my hand be against him, but let the hand of the Philistines be against him.”

He wanted to send David on suicide missions against the Philistines! He wanted to have the Philistines kill David so that he wouldn’t have to!

We often assume that we live in an overtly politicized world, and to a certain extent I think that’s true, however, politics have always been a driving force behind why people do the things they do.

Because in our passage, Saul is motivated by maintaining political power. He’s willing to use his power, influence, and even his own family to hang on to the kingdom. Had he killed David himself he would have done irreparable damage to his own favorability… but if David died in battle, no one would have batted an eye. In Saul’s mind, that’s a win-win situation!

We’ve all heard stories about soldiers who were spared because he was carrying the Bible or had some sort of coin that absorbed or deflected a bullet. We’ve all heard stories where someone’s life was saved through unusual or unexpected circumstances.

And in many ways, we have something similar in our passage. David didn’t avoid Saul’s devious plan because he saw through it. He avoided Saul’s devious plan because of his personal holiness. It’s amazing isn’t it?

David responds to marrying Merab, which was something he was entitled to by the way, with the utmost humility. “Who am I, and who are my relatives, my father's clan in Israel, that I should be son-in-law to the king?”

In other words, “I’m a nobody. I don’t deserve to be the King’s son-in-law.” David was keenly aware of his unworthiness, because he didn’t really bring anything to the table. This wasn’t some sort of fake humility in order to impress those around him, this was entirely sincere.

After all, David was a nobody. He was from nowhereville. He was a shepherd. He didn’t even have pure jewish blood coursing through his veins because of his Moabite great-grandmother – some woman named Ruth!

David was keenly aware of who he was and who Saul was.

So instead of giving Merab to David, Saul gave her to Adriel the Meholathite.

One of the things that I’ve learned from my limited experience in ministry is that the more you try to exercise control over people – the better the odds are they’re eventually going to leave. When you say it like that – it sounds obvious doesn’t it? But I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve heard stories where ministers try to prevent people from leaving their church and guess what ends up happening – they end up leaving their church anyway!

Isn’t that similar to what we see in our text? Saul is pulling all these crazy strings, cooking up these wild schemes against David in order to prevent him from ever being King in Israel, but as we all know, David eventually becomes King in Israel.

It’s not really up to Saul to decide who will be the next King in Israel - that’s something that God determines and the harder Saul fights against the will of God the more pathetic it seems.

Try as you might, you cannot usurp, undermine, or prevent the purposes of God.

Obviously God’s hand of protection is on David, but he protected him through unexpected means – his humility. It’s also clear that David is wholly devoted to the Lord which was demonstrated through his humility, personal holiness that makes him impossible for Saul to control!

Many years ago, I had a conversation that has since been seared into my brain. A friend’s father had founded a successful business and was looking to hand it off to him once he matured. He had a brother that had no interest in the family business, but my friend did.

I’ll never forget what he said. He said, “how can you walk away when someone is waving millions of dollars in your face?” And to be fair, that’s exactly the sort of thinking you would expect. If someone is offering you millions of dollars, you take it! Why on earth would you ever turn down money, prestige, and honor?

I’m almost done with my George Washington biography, so you all only have a few more weeks of George Washington illustrations, but it was a common criticism during Washington’s presidency that he secretly wanted to establish a monarchy in America and crown himself the first king in America. Part of the reason that rumor gained so much traction was because Washington was a staunch federalist. He advocated for a strong central government, and because of that some believed he was moving America towards a monarchy.

So you can imagine the shock, confusion, and awe particularly from Washington’s political opponents when he stepped down from the presidency after serving only two terms. He regularly fantasized about returning to civilian life at Mount Vernon.

In many ways what makes Washington such a remarkable historical figure is that he had all sorts of power at his fingertips but was always willing to walk away from it.

You know it’s interesting because eventually David gains money, prestige, and honor, but it was never the all consuming force in his life because his satisfaction is in the Lord.

One of the wonderful promises of God’s Word is that he will always protect his children.

III. God Empowers (vv. 20-27)

God not only protects his people, but he also empowers them. Isn’t that painfully obvious based upon our passage?

Because when Saul discovered that his other daughter, Michal, loved David, he was pleased to give her to him so that she could be a snare to him and that the hand of the Philistines would be against him.

Whereas there was no bride price for Merab, this time Saul required a bride price of 100 Philistine foreskins.

For David these were agreeable terms. In fact, we’re told in verse 26 that David was pleased with Saul’s bride price. The first marriage proposal required nothing of him, this one gave him an opportunity to demonstrate his commitment to Saul and Israel. Now, he has something to bring to the table.

But the whole reason Saul required 100 Philistine foreskins of David was to set up mission impossible. Again, he was trying to kill David by the hands of the Philistines.

We of course know what happened: David went out with his men and didn't kill 100 Philistines, no he killed 200 Philistines.

Whenever you read incredible feats in God’s Word you have to ask yourself: who deserves the credit here? Is this really about David’s impressive military skills or about God? It’s about God and how he empowered David to accomplish this amazing thing.

Now of course, David occupies an important place in redemptive history, but there is certainly still something here for us to glean. I don’t think any of us are going to be asked to kill 100 Philistines anytime soon, but you never know.

But the truth is, Christians must recognize where they derive their strength and power. David’s strength and power to kill 200 Philistines wasn’t something he mustered up on his own. It was the Lord who empowered him.

For whatever it’s worth, I’m always looking for ways to improve my time management. I don’t think I’m consistently irresponsible with my time, but the reason I’m always looking for ways to improve my time management is because I want to make the most and best use of my time. How can I efficiently get everything done that I feel like I need to on a day to day basis – that’s something that I’m always looking at.

All that to say, there’s a video that’s gone completely viral on the internet of a guy named Ashton Hall, who has this crazy morning routine where he wakes up at 3:52am so that he can, do some push ups, write some things down notebook, drink a lot of fancy water from a glass bottle, workout, shower, rub a banana peel on his face, all from his fancy apartment. It all sounds ridiculous, but I didn’t make any of that up.

There’s absolutely a subliminal message to his morning routine. The message is if you implement a morning routine like his then you’ll be as successful as he is.

But is life really that simple? It’s almost as like if you regimen your life perfectly you can eliminate the curse of the fall. You need Jesus Christ. But of course, the truth is God is sovereign over all things. He’s given each of us strengths, weaknesses and callings.

The Lord empowers his people. How else could David kill 200 Philistines? In many ways, Goliath seems like nothing compared to 200 men, right? The Lord was with him. He was his strength and shield.

All good things are gifts from his hand, which is so counterintuitive to the way we generally live our lives. We’re all led to believe any success we’ve ever experienced is the direct result of our hard work. We worked hard and as a result success followed. When that’s our approach, we leave God completely out of the equation, when we must recognize that he is central to it.

IV. God Grants Success (vv. 28-30)

Here’s an amazing truth: you’ll find success, strength, and support (however you want to define those things) when you give more of yourself away to Jesus Christ.

Remember what Jesus said, “I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”

Do you believe that apart from him you can do nothing? Do you actually believe that? Would your life look very different if tomorrow you said, I don’t believe in Jesus? Exactly how dependent are you on the Lord?

Obviously, David was an impressive warrior, right? But then again so was Goliath? I’m sure there were some intimidating Philistines that were among the 200 that he killed. And so you have to stop and ask the question, what’s the difference?

David killed all of those Philistines which forced Saul to give Michal to David, but verse 28 is significant. Look at it with me: “But when Saul saw and knew that the Lord was with David, and that Michal, Saul's daughter, loved him, 29 Saul was even more afraid of David. So Saul was David's enemy continually.”

Saul knew that the Lord was with David.

At some point you have to say, David’s success wasn’t just about his skill and effort. David’s success wasn’t because he had implemented the perfect morning routine. Even the man who had rejected the Lord countless times could look at David and know that the Lord was with him, and it made him afraid of David.

The difference between David and everyone else is that the Lord’s favor and blessing was upon him.

Because what did David do to earn God’s favor? In 2 Samuel 7, which is where God makes a special covenant with David promising that his kingdom would have no end, the Lord said this to David:

“I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep, that you should be prince over my people Israel. 9 And I have been with you wherever you went and have cut off all your enemies from before you.”

And here’s my point, David was protected, empowered, and successful as a result of God’s unmerited favor in his life. It’s not like David is receiving what he deserved. He’s the recipient of God’s grace.

The greatest blessings are the blessings you contribute nothing to.

To be a blessed person is to be like David - a recipient of God’s grace. That’s the crux of the gospel message isn’t it? You’re a sinner and yet God being rich in his love and mercy sent his son Jesus Christ to die on the cross for our sins.

The late R.C. Sproul would say you only contribute the sin that made it necessary to begin with. When you receive and rest in the person of Jesus Christ and submit your life to him – that’s what makes you a blessed person.

David understood that he was a sinner and looked forward to a Savior – and he was a blessed man. You may be the recipient of material blessings, but that’s not fundamentally what makes you a blessed person. What makes you a blessed person is receiving the unmerited grace through Jesus Christ. That’s what makes you blessed. Amen. Let’s pray together.